# What is working time recording and how is it done?

- Canonical: https://qrgate.az/en/working-time-recording
- Markdown: https://qrgate.az/en/working-time-recording.md
- Language: en

**Working time recording** means capturing and calculating the time an employee spends according to their work pattern. It is both a requirement of employment law and the basis for correct pay. This guide covers what the recording consists of, the forms it takes, its legal grounding, and what changes in practice when a company moves to electronic recording.

## The basic concept

Recording documents the answers to three questions: when did the employee start work, when did they finish, and how much of that period counts as working time. The third question is the hardest, because the answer depends on the company's internal rules - breaks, preparation time and shift handover can all be treated differently.

The output of the recording is usually a table known as a **timesheet**: rows are employees, columns are days, and each cell holds either the hours worked or a symbol representing an exception.

## Planned and actual time

Two figures always sit side by side in a proper record:

- **Planned time** - derived from the schedule. How many days and hours should this employee work this month?
- **Actual time** - derived from the records. How much did they actually work?

The difference between the two is the basis of all analysis: a negative gap means absence or lateness, a positive one means overtime. A system that stores only actual time is not a record - it is a collection of timestamps.

## Forms of recording

| Form | Suitable for | Weak point |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Paper log | Very small teams | Filled in later, easily lost |
| Excel sheet | Up to twenty or thirty people | Manual entry, formula errors |
| Terminal or card system | A fixed entry point | Hardware and installation |
| Mobile or QR system | Multi-point and field work | Requires a phone |

The choice depends less on company size than on the working pattern: a terminal works for two hundred people in one office, but not for thirty people spread across three sites.

## Reports and corrections

No form of recording removes the need for corrections entirely: forgotten check-outs, technical faults, business trips. What matters is that corrections are managed. Three rules are enough:

1. Only an authorised person makes the correction.
2. The reason is recorded.
3. The original value is not deleted; the history is kept.

Without these rules the report does not work as evidence in a dispute.

## A practical example

At a construction company records were kept by site managers. Each site sent its own sheet and everything was merged into one file at the office. At month end this alone consumed three to four days.

During the move to electronic recording the main change was organisational rather than technical: the schedules were written into the system for the first time. It turned out that two sites started the working day at a different hour, while the timesheet showed the same time everywhere.

Once that inconsistency was removed the report became both faster and truthful. The three to four days at month end fell to a few minutes.

## The most common problems

- **No written schedule.** Without a plan there is no basis for comparing the actual figures.
- **Unclear break policy.** Departments within the same company calculate differently.
- **Night shifts split across two days.** The calculation formula does not account for it.
- **No symbols for exceptions.** Leave and business trips are recorded as absences.

## The legal basis of recording

Working time recording is not only an internal management tool - it acts as a document in employment relations. Pay calculation, overtime payment and disciplinary measures all rest on these records.

Two requirements follow. The first is **traceability**: the source of every figure must be demonstrable. The second is **integrity**: later changes must not erase the original value.

In practice disputes usually arise around overtime and absence. In both cases the decision refers to the timesheet - and the timesheet only becomes an argument when the records were created at the moment of the event and the history of corrections was kept.

The retention period should also be defined in advance, since a dispute may be raised several years later.

## Moving to digital recording

The sequence that works in practice is: first the schedules are formalised, then the recording points are defined, then a trial runs in one department, and finally the report format is agreed with payroll. Following this order, the rollout completes in a few weeks.

One point deserves attention: the system does not create the rules. The lateness threshold, the break policy and the exception list are the company's decisions; the software only applies them consistently.

## Dividing the roles

Recording is not one person's job, and the division of responsibility should be clear in advance. Four roles take part in practice.

**The employee** is responsible for making the record and must be able to see their own data. **The direct manager** approves exceptions and corrections - they know their team's real situation best. **The HR specialist** finalises the timesheet and ensures the rules are applied consistently. **Payroll** is the end user and the party with requirements about the format.

Without this division the whole load falls on HR, which collects, verifies and approves everything. The process then becomes both slow and error-prone, because an HR specialist cannot know the daily situation of every department.

## How to check the quality of your recording

Five questions are enough to assess how reliable the current recording is:

1. Are the schedules written down and defined for every role?
2. Is the break rule applied identically in every department?
3. Does a list of exception types exist, and is each one marked separately?
4. Is there a defined rule for incomplete records?
5. Are the author and reason for corrections retained?

If two of the five answers are "no", the recording will not hold up in a dispute.

There is one more practical test: take a random cell from last month's timesheet and trace step by step where that number came from. If it cannot be traced, the document exists formally but is not reliable in substance.

## The management value of recording

Working time recording is often seen as compulsory work done only for payroll. In practice the same data answers three management questions.

**Resource planning.** Which unit systematically works beyond the norm? This question underpins headcount decisions and is far more convincing when supported by numbers.

**Cost of delivery.** How many person-hours did a project or site actually consume? In service companies this directly affects pricing.

**Process improvement.** Which operation takes longer than expected? Measuring waiting and preparation time often produces unexpected findings.

These three uses significantly increase the value of recording - the data is collected anyway, it is simply not fully used.

## The next step

A simple check reveals the current state of your recording: take last month's timesheet and follow where the figure for one employee's day comes from. If it cannot be traced, the recording is not reliable.

QRGate collects records instantly and reconciles them with the schedule. [See what QRGate can do](https://qrgate.az/en/advantages) or [calculate the price](https://qrgate.az/en).

### Related pages

- [Electronic working time recording system](https://qrgate.az/en/electronic-working-time-recording-system)
- [How to calculate employee working hours](https://qrgate.az/en/calculating-employee-working-hours)
- [The most common recording mistakes](https://qrgate.az/en/working-time-recording-mistakes)

## FAQ

### What exactly does working time recording document?

Three things: when the employee started work, when they finished, and how much of that period counts as working time. The third question is the hardest, because the answer depends on the company's own rules on breaks, preparation time and shift handover.

### Why must planned and actual hours be kept side by side?

Because their difference is the basis of every analysis: a negative gap means absence or lateness, a positive one means overtime. A system that stores only actual hours is not a record - it is a collection of timestamps.

### How do you check whether your recording is reliable?

Take one cell from last month's timesheet and trace where that number came from, step by step. If it cannot be traced, the document exists formally but will not hold up in a dispute.

### Where should the move from paper or spreadsheets start?

With the work schedules. Collecting records before the plan is written down gives nothing, because there is no basis for comparison. Once the schedules exist, the recording and reporting stages go far more smoothly.

### How should the data be handed over to payroll?

Agree the format with the payroll team once and write it down: which columns, the rounding step, whether overtime appears separately. Exporting that cut in a supported format - Excel or PDF - then removes a reformatting task that would otherwise repeat every month.

## Related pages

- Preparing a timesheet - [Markdown](https://qrgate.az/en/how-to-prepare-a-timesheet.md) | [HTML](https://qrgate.az/en/how-to-prepare-a-timesheet)
- Electronic timesheet system - [Markdown](https://qrgate.az/en/electronic-timesheet-system.md) | [HTML](https://qrgate.az/en/electronic-timesheet-system)
- Employee check-in system - [Markdown](https://qrgate.az/en/employee-check-in-check-out-system.md) | [HTML](https://qrgate.az/en/employee-check-in-check-out-system)
- Attendance report - [Markdown](https://qrgate.az/en/attendance-report.md) | [HTML](https://qrgate.az/en/attendance-report)
- Leave and time-off management - [Markdown](https://qrgate.az/en/leave-and-time-off-management.md) | [HTML](https://qrgate.az/en/leave-and-time-off-management)
- Preparing a work schedule - [Markdown](https://qrgate.az/en/how-to-prepare-a-work-schedule.md) | [HTML](https://qrgate.az/en/how-to-prepare-a-work-schedule)